Exclusive – Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin said the agency’s efforts to streamline the project permitting process are crucial for winning the artificial intelligence race. 

“It is very important for us to be able to get these new projects approved, to be able to get it done as quickly as we can, to make sure the EPA isn’t slowing things down,” Zeldin told the Washington Examiner in an interview at Sen. Dave McCormick’s (R-PA) Energy and Innovation Summit in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. 

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The summit included talks from members of Trump’s cabinet, including Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and Energy Secretary Chris Wright. It addressed the Trump administration’s strategy for enhancing domestic energy production and advancing emerging technologies like artificial intelligence.

“We are in a race to make America the AI capital of the world. We are in a race to unleash energy dominance, and the Trump EPA takes our responsibility and this opportunity very seriously, to be able to do everything in our power to help lead the way,” Zeldin said. 

“When it comes to permitting, our goal is to be able to get to ‘yes,’ whenever we possibly can,” Zeldin added. “We choose to protect the environment and grow the economy. We don’t believe it’s a binary choice to choose one or the other. We choose both.” 

In the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, signed by President Donald Trump earlier this month, Republicans enacted a provision enabling companies to pay a fee to expedite environmental reviews for their projects. The measure accelerates construction, although Democrats have derided it as a “pay-to-play” scheme.

When asked whether the agency would consider offering a higher fee for an accelerated process for artificial intelligence projects, Zeldin objected. 

“That’s something that I wouldn’t have anything to add at the moment,” he said.

The summit centered on how fossil fuels, such as natural gas and coal, and other sources, like nuclear energy, can power the emerging technology. The Trump administration has tried to revive the coal industry, which has declined for decades. 

The EPA has also taken steps to boost the coal industry. Last month, the agency announced it would review its Mercury and Air Toxics Standards (MATS) for coal-fired power plants.

However, Zeldin said the reconsideration was misinterpreted by some critics, who claimed there would no longer be standards on toxic metals from coal-fired power plants. 

The administrator said that reconsidering the EPA’s Mercury and Air Toxics rule would “not result in there not being any mercury and air toxic standards; that couldn’t be any further from the truth.”

He added, “What the Biden EPA sought to do toward the end of the administration was put new rules in place that would strangulate an entire industry out of existence.” 

Zeldin added that when the Trump administration took office, the coal industry and its workers discussed how coal plants were at risk of shutting down, leading to higher energy costs. 

By reconsidering the EPA’s MAT rule that “doesn’t result in there not being any mercury and air toxic standards that couldn’t be any further from the truth,” Zeldin said. 

The EPA is also targeting another regulation requiring existing coal-fired and new natural gas plants to reduce carbon pollution by 90% using technologies such as carbon capture. 

Fossil fuel power plants are a significant source of greenhouse gas emissions, contributing 5% of total global emissions since 1990.